Monday, November 2, 2015

Trick or treat!

We didn’t arrive at the cabin until early afternoon on Saturday, which is a bit atypical, but somethings are more important (haircuts) than digging out septic drain lines. Yes, we’re dealing with the drainage problem and spent all of Saturday afternoon digging out the drain pipe. When we got to the end (where it enters the septic tank) we think we found the root of the problem. The main drain pipe is connected to the pipe that enters the septic tank with a rubber coupling. It looks like the roots were able to find a way in around and maybe through the rubber. We haven’t pulled this off yet and will need to expose more of the pipe so that it can be flexed enough to replace the coupling.

Saturday was Halloween. Once we got cleaned up from all the digging and started dinner, we turned on the front porch light and waited. We were actually surprised to get two small kids looking for some treats. Surprised because the cabin sits at the back of the lot, quite a ways from the street and blocked by some trees. So it’s not real visible from the street. Then about an hour later, another group of kids showed up! Maybe next year we should light the driveway with pumpkins, that might get us a few more victims kids.

Sunday it rained, rain is good, we need more of that, but it also meant that we didn’t get to do any more digging (oh darn!). So instead we hung plastic on the ceiling upstairs in preparation for texturing. Now you might think that covering the ceiling with plastic would be a fairly quick task. Ha! The ceiling is vaulted and really goes from peak to floor. The total length from peak to floor is about 14 ft. so we need about four 9 x 12 sheets of plastic. We’re trying to avoid having to pull staples out of the ceiling an beams so the current method of attaching it is tape. First we run a tape edge on the ceiling next to the wall, then we tape the plastic to the tape edge. Most of this work is done while standing on a ladder, which means a lot of up ‘n down the ladder to get it in the right position. The back bedroom is all wrapped up and that took between 4 and 5 hours. We also did most of the closet and a hung a couple of sheets in the front bedroom. Texturing will commence next weekend.

Where are we now?
weekend n+0 - drywall prep (October 17/18th did some, not as much as planned)
weekend n+1 - finish drywall prep for texture (October 23/24/25 - texturing started)
weekend n+2 - texture & prime (October 31st / November 1st - prepping for texture)
weekend n+3 - paint & start bathroom floor tile & finish bathroom electrical
weekend n+4 - finish bathroom tile & re-install vanity & toilet
weekend n+5 - install doors & start knee wall framing
weekend n+6 - install laminate
weekend n+7 - finish laminate (baseboard & casing?)
weekend n+8 - knee wall work
weekend n+9 - knee wall work
weekend n+10 - knee wall work

So we’re easily one week behind as we should have been texturing and priming. If all goes well, we’ll be doing that next weekend. However, since the drainage issues are fixed, we’re going to have to spend some more time on that at some point.